ReThinking

Julie Bowen is an Emmy Award-winning actress best known from her roles as Claire on Modern Family and Virginia in Happy Gilmore. She’s also a former host of the podcast Quitters, which she eventually quit. In this episode, Adam and Julie are joined by developmental psychologist Aliza Pressman for a delightful conversation about authenticity, emotional intelligence, and parenting. Julie makes the case for why sometimes quitting is the most mature thing to do, and shares what she’s learned from coaching her sons through commitments they no longer wanted to uphold. She interrogates Adam about his inability to get angry, and he and Aliza speculate on what would happen if everyone was perfectly emotionally regulated. The three also reflect on the difficult truth that you cannot change how others act, and explore strategies for teaching kids (and yourself) how to handle conflict between the values you hold and the way you actually behave.

Featured guests
Follow Julie Bowen on Instagram and TikTok
Follow Aliza Pressman on Instagram, LinkedIn, Substack, and at draliza.com/

Connect with the team
Follow Adam on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at adamgrant.net/
Subscribe to Adam’s Substack Granted
Watch ReThinking videos on YouTube at TEDPods
Follow TED on X, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and TikTok
ReThinking is produced by Cosmic Standard. Our Senior Producer is Jessica Glazer, our Engineer is Aja Simpson, our Technical Director is Jacob Winik, and our Executive Producer is Eliza Smith.

For the full text transcript, visit ted.com/podcasts/rethinking-with-adam-grant-transcripts
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Adam joins an improv comedy workshop and comes away with new insights about facing failure, building resilience, boosting creativity, and elevating collaboration. He takes the stage in Authors@Wharton with a pair of past Re:Thinking guests, data scientist Andrea Jones-Rooy and animal cognition researcher Justin Gregg, who happen to moonlight as improv comedy performers. In this unique episode, Andrea and Justin throw Adam headfirst into a series of improv exercises and lead a lively, often hilarious discussion of the practical lessons.

Featured guest
Follow Andrea Jones-Rooy on Instagram, LinkedIn, and https://www.jonesrooy.com/
Follow Justin Gregg on Instagram, Substack, and at justingregg.com/
Listen to Andrea's podcast, Behind the Data
Buy Justin's books here

Connect with the team
Follow Adam on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at adamgrant.net/
Subscribe to Adam’s Substack Granted
Watch ReThinking videos on YouTube at TEDPods
Follow TED on X, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and TikTok

ReThinking is produced by Cosmic Standard. Our Senior Producer is Jessica Glazer, our Engineer is Aja Simpson, our Technical Director is Jacob Winik, and our Executive Producer is Eliza Smith.

For the full text transcript, visit ted.com/podcasts/rethinking-with-adam-grant-transcripts
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Maria Sharapova is one of only 10 women to complete a Career Grand Slam in tennis, and was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2025. After retiring in 2020, she has also become a mother, an investor, and podcast host. In this episode, Adam talks with Maria about resilience, motivation, and the evolution of her rivalry with Serena Williams. Maria reflects on the moments in her career that forced her to take a step back and rethink her mindset, from hard losses and wisdom from coaches to relationships with her peers and opponents. Adam offers insight on two different kinds of winning in psychology, and why sports aren’t really as zero-sum as they seem.

Featured guest
Follow Maria Sharapova on Instagram, YouTube, and X
Subscribe to Maria's Substack Pretty Tough
Buy her book Unstoppable: My Life So Far

Connect with the team
Follow Adam on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at adamgrant.net/
Subscribe to Adam’s Substack Granted
Watch ReThinking videos on YouTube at TEDPods
Follow TED on X, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and TikTok

ReThinking is produced by Cosmic Standard. Our Senior Producer is Jessica Glazer, our Engineer is Aja Simpson, our Technical Director is Jacob Winik, and our Executive Producer is Eliza Smith.

For the full text transcript, visit ted.com/podcasts/rethinking-with-adam-grant-transcripts
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Your beliefs about yourself and the world have a big impact on your mental health, relationships, and success. As a positive psychology evangelist, Shawn Achor has spent his career studying how to challenge and change the core beliefs that might be holding you back, and shares his insights in his new book, The Power of Beliefs. In this episode, Shawn and Adam dive into the surprising connections between happiness and success, and discuss the science of optimism and pessimism. Shawn also describes seven key important beliefs that underlie happiness, breaks down strategies for shifting beliefs, and asks Adam to weigh in on how to convince leaders to care about the well-being of their people.

Featured guest
Follow Shawn Achor on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at https://www.shawnachor.com/
Buy The Power of Beliefs

Connect with the team
Follow Adam on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at adamgrant.net/
Subscribe to Adam’s Substack Granted
Watch ReThinking videos on YouTube at TEDPods
Follow TED on X, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and TikTok

ReThinking is produced by Cosmic Standard. Our Senior Producer is Jessica Glazer, our Engineer is Aja Simpson, our Technical Director is Jacob Winik, and our Executive Producer is Eliza Smith.

For the full text transcript, visit ted.com/podcasts/rethinking-with-adam-grant-transcripts
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Many people regularly plunge into ice-cold water to soothe soreness or boost energy—but for some, the plunge itself is a sport. As a sports journalist, Chris Ballard was reporting on cold water immersion when he got into ice swimming himself and ended up competing on the US team at world championships. In this episode, Adam dives into Chris’s book The Plunge, and the two discuss the psychology behind risk taking, endurance, and resilience in the face of discomfort. They explore why people seek out extreme challenges that push their minds and bodies to the limit, and separate myth from science about the health benefits of cold water immersion.

Featured guest

Follow Chris Ballard on Instagram, LinkedIn, and chrisballardwritings.com/
Buy The Plunge: Maverick Swimmers, an Unlikely Quest, and the Transformative Power of Cold Water

Connect with the team

Follow Adam on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at adamgrant.net/
Subscribe to Adam’s Substack Granted
Watch ReThinking videos on YouTube at TEDPods
Follow TED on X, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and TikTok
ReThinking is produced by Cosmic Standard. Our Senior Producer is Jessica Glazer, our Engineer is Aja Simpson, our Technical Director is Jacob Winik, and our Executive Producer is Eliza Smith.

For the full text transcript, visit ted.com/podcasts/rethinking-with-adam-grant-transcripts
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.